Multi-talented pianist, composer, arranger and producer Bob James was a veteran of CTI and his own Tappan Zee label when he signed with Warner Bros. Records in 1986.1 At the time, the label boasted such crossover-jazz artists as fellow former CTI All Star George Benson, the Yellowjackets, Al Jarreau, Randy Crawford, Michael Franks and David Sanborn.
It seems likely that bassist and composer Marcus Miller, who was all of 27 years old at the time, and himself a Warner Bros. recording artist, played some part in bringing both Bob James and Miles Davis to the label. Miller first started working with both artists in 1981, while each were signed to Columbia, notably on James’s Sign of the Times and Davis’s The Man with the Horn. The great bassist and consummate musician continued to work with each leader right up until their own Warner Bros. debuts.
While the journeys Miles Davis and Bob James took during their Warner Bros. tenures were very different, the former’s lasted until the trumpeter’s 1991 death while James’s lasted through 2002, long after those other jazz-ish acts on WB had fled, or were fired. Their destinations led distinctively to music well beyond what they had laid down before.
At the time, I wasn’t particularly enamored with Bob James’ Warner Bros. debut, Double Vision, an album he co-led with alto saxophonist David Sanborn. But, in truth, the music was changing, as it should and always will (James would also play a part in helming the next seismic shift with the 1991 debut album of the all-star foursome Fourplay).
After four decades, I decided it was time to give the record another spin.
II.
Double Vision was released in May 1986, some four months before Miles Davis’ own remarkable Warner Bros. debut, Tutu. It is a high-water mark in Bob James’s career and one that AllMusic’s Neil Tesser correctly considers a “foundational-piece of the smooth-jazz phenomenon.” The disc went on to become a chart-topper (where it had a 64-week run), million-seller, Grammy Award-winner and the one all the others had to measure up to – that is, at least, until Fourplay, James’s next smooth-jazz triumph, debuted some five years later.
For his first record on Warner Bros., James was teamed with Grammy Award-winning saxophonist David Sanborn, who, by this time, had built a sizable audience of his own. Sanborn had been with Warner Bros. since his 1975 solo debut, and was a busy session player that factored on many jazz, fusion and crossover records. He was even well-known to pop audiences, with distinctive solos on such hits as James Taylor’s “How Sweet it Is” and David Bowie’s “Young Americans” (both 1975).
Sanborn first worked with James on the little-known CTI-Kudu album Tennyson-Upchurch (1975) and went on to appear on several of the pianist’s discs, starting with James’s Columbia/Tappan Zee debut Heads (1977).
I was working in a record store the year Double Vision came out and one of the managers there loved it (hey Joanne!). We played it in the store all the time and it sold like crazy when we did. Was I happy that the guy I spent the last few years digging was finally getting his due? Or, was I ticked off that my little secret was out? Maybe a bit of both. But I remember thinking that this was a different kind of Bob James than I grew up with.
How so? For one thing, while David Sanborn always sounded like David Sanborn, Bob James sounded different here than he had before. It took me many years to figure out what it was about Double Vision that threw me off – or left me a little cold. James, who had been playing the Fender Rhodes since 1969 and developed a signature touch on that warm, bell-toned electric piano, had switched here to the much brighter, metallic, almost synthetic-sounding Yamaha DX-7.
According to the multi-talented keyboard player and popular YouTuber Pierre Piscitelli, the Yamaha DX-7 was introduced in 1983, offering keyboard players a more portable and affordable option than the 150-pound Fender Rhodes. The DX-7 was ubiquitous in its day, opening such hits as Chicago’s “Hard Habit to Break” (1984), Starship’s “Sara” (1985), Whitney Houston’s “The Greatest Love of All” (1985 – here, paired with a Fender Rhodes), Linda Ronstadt and James Ingram’s “Somewhere Out There” (1986), and Michael Bolton’s “How Am I Supposed to Live Without You” (1989). The instrument also introduced Al Jarreau’s 1984 Warner Bros. hit “After All,” as well.
If the Fender Rhodes was the electric keyboard sound of the seventies, then the Yamaha DX-7 quickly became the sound of the eighties.
As Piscitelli says, the DX-7 either makes you feel “sentimental or nostalgic” or it “makes your skin crawl.” For me, back then, it came closer to the latter, but today I would say I have moved closer to the middle of those two poles. As to the ascendency of the DX-7 in the eighties over the Fender Rhodes, I tend to feel like listeners in the seventies who admired such pianists as Bill Evans, Ahmad Jamal, Paul Bley and Oscar Peterson, when those players “went electric” for the first time. (Incidentally, I happen to love those discs, too).
While the Yamaha DX-7 was not appealing to me at the time, listening to Double Vision today convinces me that the sound didn’t age particularly well either. It has a very dated, time-specific ring. It sounds entirely too processed or manufactured, not natural. Despite all of Bob James’ talent and best intentions, he isn’t capable of giving this sound his own signature. I doubt anyone really could. The sound, like a Barbie doll, is all pretty with no personality.
III.
Double Vision, in spite of itself, though, has personality to spare. The record is clearly dominated by Sanborn’s signature plaintive wail. But James – despite getting the record’s first billing – sounds comfortable in what almost seems like a supporting or “guest star” role. The dynamic duo, who clearly share a strong chemistry together, is accompanied by a tight group featuring Marcus Miller on bass and Steve Gadd on drums.
Like Miller, Gadd had previously worked often with both players: with James, as far back as Hubert Laws’ 1974 CTI disc In the Beginning, and with Sanborn, since Laws’ 1975 album The Chicago Theme, also on CTI and also with Bob James.
West Coast session guitarist Paul Milton Jackson, Jr. – who is not The Headhunters guitarist – is nearly inaudible on guitar, while fellow West Coaster Paulinho Da Costa adds an unobtrusive touch of percussion. Special guests include fellow Warner Bros. recording artist Al Jarreau on “Since I Fell for You” and guitarist Eric Gale (a former CTI session player and longtime Bob James asset, whose first encounter with Sanborn was also the aforementioned The Chicago Theme) on two tracks.
The crisp, clean, dare I say smooth, production was done by neither Bob James – who had produced all of his previous Tappan Zee releases – nor Marcus Miller (who had produced Sanborn’s previous album, the 1984 Straight to the Heart), but rather by hit-making veteran Tommy LiPuma.
LiPuma, who had previously produced Barbra Streisand’s 1974 The Way We Were and former CTI All Star guitarist George Benson’s Breezin’ (1976) and Weekend in L.A. (1978) – not to mention later successes by Natalie Cole, Diana Krall and Paul McCartney – was responsible for this particular production.
IV.
Over the years I have warmed considerably to this disc. There’s no denying the allure of Marcus Miller’s disc opener, “Maputo,” probably the album’s best-known track. “Maputo,” like many of the Yamaha DX-7 hits noted above, yet unlike far too much smooth jazz, has stood the test of time, sounding as fresh today as it did back then.
The album’s best tracks are otherwise buried in the mix and include “Moon Tune,” co-written by the two leaders and the most overtly James-like sounding track on the disc, and Sanborn’s exceptional “It’s You” (first heard on Sanborn’s 1981 Voyeur, also with Marcus Miller and Steve Gadd).
I was surprised, particularly in light of how often I heard this record back in the day, to discover anew the exciting outros on “Since I Fell for You” and “Never Enough.” Although I somehow missed it the first time around, this group can whip up a remarkably heady bit of steam.
Naturally, the jazz press avoided Double Vision like the plague. Indeed, DownBeat only referenced the disc, in passing, during a David Sanborn feature interview.2 Billboard raved – correctly – that “James’ label debut is a certain fusion/crossover smash,” adding that “Sanborn’s stock with black radio…should strike sparks at retail.”3 Indeed, it did.
Double Vision was promoted in the music-trade papers as featuring the “Hit Tracks” “Maputo” and “Since I Fell for You.” A 4-minute 34-second edit of the “Maputo” (originally 6:50) was, in fact, issued as a single (WB 7-28603) and likely scored airplay on jazz and adult contemporary radio stations. The song, however, never seemed to chart.
The James-Sanborn cover of Buddy Johnson’s forties-era “Since I Fell For You” (a 1963 hit for Lenny Welch) never received a single release. The song did, however, get some initial airplay on R&B radio stations, but not enough to get Warner Bros. to issue a single version.
A promotional single of the album’s closer, “You Don’t Know Me,” was issued (WB PRO-A-2603), however it must not have attracted that much attention. The fifties-era Eddy Arnold song, a huge 1962 hit for Ray Charles, is very much a feature for David Sanborn here. Bob James barely even registers on the song. It certainly doesn’t seem like the sort of thing that would have attracted a Bob James fan…then or now.
Bob James, David Sanborn, James Genus and Steve Gadd, North Sea Jazz, 2013
V.
While the Japanese CD releases of most Bob James discs – and, later, Fourplay – often featured a bonus track that’s not on the American release, such an Easter Egg never appeared on various Japanese CD issues of Double Vision.
But in 2003, Double Vision was reissued in Europe – notably not in the U.S. or Japan – with not one but two bonus tracks, the funky (and oddly-titled) “Luthor,” a feature of unknown provenance for Sanborn (with little that’s detectably Jamesian),4 and Carole King and Gerry Goffin’s “Hey, Girl,” a hit for Freddie Scott in 1963 (what’s up with all the sixties pop hits here?) and Donny Osmond in 1971. Both tracks are easily found on YouTube.
Evosound, Bob James’s current label affiliation, reissued Double Vision – without the bonus tracks – on vinyl and 24kt Gold MQA-CD in 2019 and on Hybrid SACD in 2024. Both “It’s You” and “You Don’t Know Me” are also featured on the 1995 David Sanborn compilation Love Songs.
Remarkably, Bob James and David Sanborn didn’t cross paths with one another until reuniting – with Double Vision drummer Steve Gadd – in 2013 for Quartette Humaine. James Genus replaced Marcus Miller on bass for this one.
The all-acoustic set was said to be inspired by the interplay of the quartet Dave Brubeck – who had passed away the week before the disc’s recording – had with Paul Desmond, who, like, Sanborn, had his own distinctly unique tone on alto saxophone. This one, however, is dominated more by James, who handled the arrangements, but is not nearly as memorable as Double Vision.
The sole exception here, though, is the supremely fun and funky Bob James original “Deep in the Weeds.”
Fans may want to note that the reformed James/Sanborn quartet re-recorded “Maputo” during this time. This version of “Maputo” can be found only on the rare six-track vinyl issue of Quartette Humaine. That song and “The Night Has a Thousand Eyes” can also be found as “bonus tracks” on the Japanese CD edition of the Quartette Humaine. Both of these discs are now extremely hard to find and very expensive to get.
Sadly, David Sanborn, who remained beloved and popular throughout his prolific multi-decade career, passed away in May 2024. He was 78 years old.
While Double Vision no doubt scored legions of new superfans for Bob James and David Sanborn, it was still something of a jolt to those of us who discovered Bob James in the decade before this 1986 release. Revisiting the record some four decades later, this longtime BJ-lover was happily surprised by the disc’s pure enjoyability.
It easily bests the two Bob James albums that bookend it, 12 (1984) and Obsession (also 1986) and remains among the best of the discs the pianist waxed for Warner Bros. between 1986 and 2002. Others I would cite include Ivory Coast (1988), Grand Piano Canyon (1990), Cool (1993, with Earl Klugh), Straight Up (1996), Dancing on the Water (2001) and the first Fourplay disc (1991).
Unlike so much of the Fuzak that passed for music – or jazz – in the years since, Double Vision still stands out. To my sensibilities, the program leans a little too heavily on perky takes of ballad fare and has little of the provocative and colorful programming James learned earlier on from producer Creed Taylor.
But that was a very different period in the music. Bob James, David Sanborn and, to a large extant Marcus Miller – who wisely warns us today not be afraid of the f-word (fusion) – not only foresaw the changing times, they helped usher in the change.
Endnotes:
- Billboard, February 22, 1986, p. 60. ↩︎
- DownBeat, August 1986, p. 17. ↩︎
- Billboard, May 31, 1986, p. 60. ↩︎
- To these ears, “Luthor” – possibly named for Luther Vandross – sounds a lot like a Marcus Miller composition that could have easily appeared on an earlier Sanborn album. For the record, Vandross had previously appeared on the Bob James albums Sign of the Times (1981) and Hands Down (1982), Marcus Miller’s Suddenly (1983) and David Sanborn’s Backstreet (1983). ↩︎